


A Comforting Nightmare

by Urbenmyth



Series: Tales Beyond The Archives [1]
Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Feel free to decide if the avatar is someone we know or some nerd, I-Did-Not-Want-This isn't an offical name, Literally just my headcanon on the web, but I like it and its my fanfic, literally just a drabble
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-09
Updated: 2020-10-09
Packaged: 2021-03-07 16:35:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 822
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26920744
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Urbenmyth/pseuds/Urbenmyth
Summary: People assume the Web simply chooses a minion and makes them an avatar. Not so. If the Mother Of Puppets chooses you, you get a choice like everyone else.Here it is.
Series: Tales Beyond The Archives [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1965088
Comments: 2
Kudos: 28





	A Comforting Nightmare

“It’s a valid question, Mr Green. Why would anyone serve the Web?

The other entities have their baubles to offer to the desperate. The Eye offers knowledge, the Flesh offers perfection, the Slaughter offers strength, the Lonely offers safety. Horrible bargains, of course. But bargains nonetheless. 

The Web, on the other hand, offers only servitude.

You might think it offers domination, but it does not. Oh, you might control minds or twist bodies, other such parlor tricks, but you are not in control. You cannot force people to do what _you_ want. You can force them to do what _she_ wants. The Web rules you, your every action under her control. If you seek power, there are other places to turn. The Web will enslave you.

And so we turn to the second option.

You do _not_ choose to serve the Web. We all serve the Web. A grand conspiracy of spiders behind everything. Everything you do is in service to the Web anyway, why not get perks with it?

Ah, it’s a good party line isn't it? Makes us look good, powerful. Stops people fucking with us. The great Puppeteer behind all the world. But would you like to know a secret, Mr Green?

The Web? _It’s just another entity_.

Let me explain. When you die, I can almost guarantee the End will not be there. You will not fall into the Terminus, Mr Green. No reaper will come for you. No, you’ll simply die. And the same for the rest. If you went to space, you would not find the Vast. If you were to walk with packs of wolves and prides of lions, you would not find the Hunt. And most battlefields have never heard the Slaughter's song.

The entities are not everywhere. In truth, they are not many places at all.

They are not Gods or Principles, you understand. Ultimately, they’re just Nightmares.

And the same applies to the Web. Everything you do...well, maybe not _you_ , but everything the Average Joe does? Utterly unrelated to I-Did-Not-Want-This. It’s not part of her plan, even by absence. She’s just not there at all. She’s only a nightmare, remember? The nightmare where someone else controls you.

And you choose a nightmare when it becomes more appealing then reality.

You serve the Flesh when the body you see in your nightmares feels better then the one you see in the mirror.

You serve the Eye when you have the nightmare of destroying yourself with knowledge and think “but at least I’d know”

And you choose the nightmare of being out of control when you fear being in control far more.

Do you know how many lives I have destroyed to serve my patron? If _I_ had done that, if _I_ made those choices to kill and worse then kill? I would cast myself from this building. How could I not? I would be a monster, irredeemable by even the most merciful god.

But that's the beauty of it _. I didn’t do it_. The _Web_ did it, and I was merely her tool. You cannot blame a gun for a murder, no? You cannot blame a pen for the words written with it. I am merely the Web’s puppet, and I cannot be blamed for what she makes me do.

 _That_ is what the Mother of Puppets offers.

So, you have a choice, Mr Green. A real choice, no compulsions or mind control. I promise. This one is just you.

Say no now, and the Web will leave your life. For real. Not as a small part of some grand scheme or subtle manipulation. We will be _gone,_ and you will be free _._ All your actions will be your own. You will be able to act or not act as you see fit.

This will, of course, mean that the life choices that lead you here were yours. Your arrogance, your greed, your selfishness, all of it. Your family’s deaths are on your hands, and yours alone, and there is no-one to shift that blame too.

Or join I-Did-Not-Want-This, and say you did not want this.

It wasn’t _your_ fault. You would have been happy to do the right thing, to be a good man. Oh, but the Mother Of Puppets pulled your strings, and made you do this, and keeps making you do this. You weep and lament as you do it, I'm sure. But it is not your fault. Who are you, to defy the Web?

This is your choice, Mr Green. The hard truth of reality, that the Web may have never touched your life before today. Or the comforting nightmare, that some all-powerful puppet master was behind the scenes the whole time, _making_ you do this.

I know its hard. But if it makes you feel better? I remember when I was in your place, Mr Green.

I remember that, for me, it was no choice at all.”


End file.
